Tuesday, April 30, 2013

Dad: Genetic Hand-Me-Downs

Every
superhero has a weakness. Superman crumbles at the sight of kryptonite
and copy editors. Batman is addicted to self-loathing. The Human Torch
is allergic to asbestos and modesty. Even Kobe Bryant tore his Achilles
Tendon, which, of course, was the only spot left vulnerable when the
gods dipped him in the River Styx at his birth.

Baby Kobe averaged just 18.0 points per game before this procedure.

As
the closest thing to a superhero my daughter knows, my weakness is a
ticklish spot at the base of my neck. All a person need do is point at
it and I become a powerless, twitching heap on the floor like Luke
Skywalker in the final battle scene of Return of the Jedi, screaming for
somebody to come help me before I die.

"STOP STOP OK IT TICKLES STOP STOP HAHAHA I CAN'T BREATHE,"
said every kid ever just before fun tickle time turned into crying.

That little spot is my Achilles Heel, if you will, and has been for as long as I can rememb. And guess who inherited it from me?

Those are tears of joy, I swear.

My
wife discovered it on Susan one morning and yelled for me to come look.
I jumped out of the shower to go see, I was so excited. “Why is this
guy so worked up about his daughter being ticklish on the neck?” you may
be asking. “Isn’t 95 percent of the world ticklish on the neck?” you
may say. “Wait, did he put a towel on after he jumped out of the shower?
Because he didn’t say.” Yes, I was wearing a towel, and I was so
excited about it because my wife is not ticklish
on the neck, so this genetic hand-me-down is all me. And isn’t that one
of the greatest things about being a parent? Seeing what pieces of you
and your wife show up in your kids? What makes you who you are in turn
making your kids who they are?

My
daughter has always looked like my wife, but as it turns out, she has
my eyes. Physical traits like hair color, eye color and which parent
they look like are all wonderful to see develop. But other traits reveal
themselves later and continue to surface over the course of a lifetime.
Maybe you’re a writer of fiction like BabyCenter blogger Charlie Brooks
and your son pens a story in the first grade that is actually pretty
good. Maybe you played soccer in college and at your daughter’s first
Pee Wee soccer game, she runs circles around everybody. Maybe you play
the piano and by age three your son can bang out a full scale and a
couple harmonies. Or maybe they’re just 13 months old and they have the
exact same tickle spot as you.

For
somebody who’s going through this for the first time, it’s exciting
stuff, like rubbing away a lottery scratch-off ticket that you know
you’re going to win. So even though all I have right now is Susan’s blue
eyes and a tickle spot, that's cause for plenty of excitement with much
more to look forward to. And one day when she turns to me and says,
"You're not the boss of me," well, she gets that from her mother.